I've been trying to use the ole white vinegar with a little lemon in to do our cleaning with lately in order to avoid the chemicals of commercial products. However, one area where this concerns me is when my lil one has an accident on the sofa or carpet? Will this effectively clean the area? What do you recommend?

Equally, my eldest daughter complains about the smell of the vinegar and it is strong especially when like me you clean the entire house with it lol! I've tried putting peelings from lemons into it, but that's not really helping at all... anyone else got any tips for a natural cleaning product that is multi-purpose, effective at cleaning and doesn't smell?

I have started a blog about my own eco journey which includes tips and recommendations which I have tried out myself.It can be found at http://www.ecojourney.blog.com

We used to cover our sofas with a throw so if there was an accident it was just a case of washing the throw. We have a nylon-based carpet (not my choice but my landlord's) which is a darkish red and I was always concerned about the colour coming out of it if scrubbed too hard.

I usually just cleaned with water with either tea-tree or lavender essential oil added; more persistent stains I would use a sprinkling of bicarb of soda with the same solution.

I took my dog to play frisbee. She was useless. I think I need a flatter dog.

Hi CT! Thanks for your response! I'll try those techniques especially adding essential oils as this will hopefully rid the scent and bicarb is a good deodourizer I hear so I'll implement that one a bit more too :D really appreciate it! As far as I'm aware our sofa is probably fully synthetic be it from DFS (this was purchased before I became a more ethical consumer). And my carpet looks like a common cream carpet that was here before we moved in so persume that's synthetic too although I'm not sure as I didn't purchase it.

I have started a blog about my own eco journey which includes tips and recommendations which I have tried out myself.It can be found at http://www.ecojourney.blog.com

When we potty trained I found that just putting a towel over the wet patch and standing on it soaked most of it up. My carpet isn't in the best condition cos of the kids anyway but I didn't get any particularly noticeable wee stains or smells at all.

I didn't get many wees on the sofa, but I don't remember dealing with them much cos it's leather so I can just wipe it over.

To aid with the whole process I gave my son a lot to drink so he needed to go more, providing more opportunity for learning and made the wee less concentrated so it stained/smelt a lot less than it might have done otherwise.